Evaluate own knowledge, performance and understandingagainst relevant standardsConsciously linking the way you work with the things that are expected of your role is

a good way to evaluate your own performance, and being able to do this ensures

that you will get the most possible from supervision sessions and other types of

reflective practice. It is also a form of reflective practice in itself.

Taking the relevant national occupational standards that are used to guide your

role's performance and knowledge base, you could conduct a methodical evaluation

of the way you work and how that connects to the standards.

Evaluation against relevant standards.

When you write your daily thoughts down, check the performance criteria for the

relevant standards. There may be more than one standard that is applicable to your

work, so ensure that you have at least one copy of each one.

Create a rough table under your writing, with four columns. Head up the columns as'What happened?', 'Performance criteria', 'What I did', and 'How will I improve mywork?'

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You have to be as honest as possible when it comes to this type of evaluation,

because without honesty it is nothing more than a theoretical exercise. The idea is

that it is actually useful to you as a learning exercise.

In the first column, write a brief note that describes the event or incident that took

place. It can be a positive or a negative thing; the idea is not to draw out only

negative experiences, but to look at your work as a whole.

Identify the performance criteria that are relevant to the incident and write those into

the second column. There may be more than one from more than one standard.

In the third column, describe roughly how you responded to the incident and what

happened. Here, you should also write whether or not the situation went as hoped,

or if it deviated unexpectedly. If it did deviate, you should write why. This column

may need to be a little wider than the others.

Were your reactions and the way you handled the situation close to the

recommended performance criteria, or did you do something completely different?

Did you get a negative or positive response? Why do you think that happened?

In the fourth and final column, suggest a way, based on the performance criteria, in

which you could deal with the situation next time something similar happens. If you

feel you need additional training, or a conversation with your line manager or another

member of staff, make a note of that there.

This may seem like a bulky, long-winded way to approach this exercise, but if you

are relatively new to your role, you may not have many examples of incident or

situations to draw upon. It is best to evaluate your own work in an on-going way; one

that reflects the work itself, so that it becomes a practical way to improve your own

work, rather than working on it in a theoretical way. One reason for this is that a

great deal of learning is experiential, and you are more likely to remember it, and for

it to have an impact, if you map it to your experiences.

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